Valiantly Blogging on a Number of Matters of the Utmost Importance, for the Benefit of All!

Sunday, April 07, 2013

UK and international welfare spending

Using OECD data from Declan Gaffney (a great blog post – do read it), I’ve made the two charts below. They look
at the amount of money different countries’ governments spend on benefits, excluding
pensions and benefits in kind.

The first shows that benefit
spending in the UK has fallen as a share of GDP, not risen. Of the 18 countries
Declan compares, the UK spending fall was the fourth-largest from 1980 to just before
the financial crash, and the fifth-largest from 1980 to 2009.

The second chart shows in
more detail how spending has gone up and down. To avoid a mass of
criss-crossing lines, I’ve included just six countries. This also shows that the
UK welfare state – not counting pensions – is not particularly expensive by
international standards.